Angry residents of the Kenyan county of Migori seized two government vehicles and filled them up with garbage Wednesday.
The residents, mostly traders and taxi drivers, dumped garbage in Migori county vehicles during a demonstration to protest poor garbage collection services, according to the Star, forcing county officials to collect public trash from the trunks of their SUV pick-ups after hijacking the vehicles.
County officials, including Environment, Natural Resources, and Disaster Management Director Elijah Odhiambo, had reportedly been on an inspection tour of the main market’s waste collection facilities, when the angry crowd grabbed them and forced them to shovel the garbage in to their own vehicles. Odhiambo barely made his escape in to another vehicle.
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A Migori county car in which residents dumped garbage in a demonstration over poor collection services, March 15, 2017. Photo credit: MANUEL ODENY
“We don’t want county officials to come here and mock us with inspections when our complaints about a dirty town have fallen on deaf ears,” John Ochieng, one of the protesters, said.
“We pay taxes daily yet the market is in a poor state. The county government has done nothing so we have decided to take action.”
Photo credit: The Standard
Residents of the county have reportedly complained repeatedly about Migori Governor Okoth Obado’s failure to improve refuse collection services and clean up the town and county as a whole.
Reports say traffic police officers stood back and simply watched as the huge crowd dumped garbage in the county vehicles.
The angry mob also vowed to impound the official Prado Toyota car of the governor and fill it up with garbage if he does not act swiftly to clean up the town in the coming days.
